The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1887-07-20
G]lle Qt,tdEiQe,urer;..
once, Nos. 20 81, and ~ Fourteenth Street.
WHY THEY DIE,

Terrible Iife This Hot Weather In tho Tone.
ment Districts Of New York. f5lE
Chicago Tribune. tif, ssi${o gSs
A writer, ]. Q. s. Huntington, In re.
cent issue Of tho Forum, makes an clio.
quent plea for the poor living in tenement
houaee, and sets forth the condition Of
their morality in a aeriss 0. very pathetic
Bketches, drawn from actual observation
through five blocks Of these houaou in ono
district In New York City. He takeo one
block as fair sample OF the whole. It is
70Ox20O feet In extent, and on all four
sides are rows OF tenonents i've etories
high. They contain l,7SG rooms, occu.
pied by 2.070 persons, tometima fourteen
or fifteen living In two rooms. Those
rooms are hnrdlvtmuro .liNn cloaets, Tho
bed rooms are 7X0. Tbs apa, tmeut room
Ia exposed to moisture from the tho c,llar
and sewer gas from lhb drains. One.
itth Of them are below the Lowell OF tho
street, and nearly half Of them open into
little courts filed with wooden priyies,
1t Is imposaible for these people to isolate
themselves. They meet each other con.
stantly, ace into each others 2foome, and
use the roof, the doorway and tho ward
IN common. privacy 10 not much mora
posaibls than an Eastern caravansary
or In the ateersg0 Of an Immigrant
yeaael." iilii So
Who are tho people who crowd these
tenement? They are mostly emigrants,
Heterogeneous mixture Of all the races
and naitonalliGs Of tho globe-Prussians,
eohenians, Swies, Scotch, Chinese, Irish.
Italians, Turks, Jewp, and Christians are
hlduled together. Z" Chey are pressed TO-
sethdr uddet conditions which make It
lmpyaslh!e for them to help themselves or
one anothsf. The bad almost inevitably
draw down the good; and tho good have
not the chance to lit up the bad. z There
10 no standard Of morality. Human ne-
.ure Ia left to do pretty nearly what IL
likes, and the lower passions arc not allow
N asserting themselves" Bodily clean.
liness 10 impossible, Tor there are no bath
rooms. Sickness and death add their hor.
!,ois. Even the sick have no privacy,
however contagious their silments may
oe. Death 10 hardly a matter even OF
tdlo curiosity, aai the corpse lies III the
room where the lAmily cats, works, and
often Bleep6. II ~ g., ~ &, ~. 60
II adults cannot resist the lowering In.
fuences about them, whist must be the lot
OF children exposed to every possibility Of
moral contagion? II they manage to ca
cape disease and reach the age when life
begins to open and they have some desire
tor happiness, what coafronts them /? The
writer answers from his own observations:
wilderness Of ignorance, poverty anu crime:
moral DESERT beautiful !oyless, utterly unSAusiy.
lug u all the best md o6leat instincts OF their
hearts Do you rea lie that In n teuFm mi house
uisttiet there Is absolutely not ono lovely thing on
which the era eau Eest3 Even thu SLY IL oien
robbed " Its fairness BY tho clouds Of smoke un
dust Tho glorics Of sunrise aud sunset arc uu.
known 1he run crawisup from among the chin.
eypots and goes down behind brick walls and
Nm ROOFS the streets alto ways filthy, the houses
ugly, tue sho,rwiauIws cneapy gaudy or nj gltct.
cd anu covered with dust; the blocks are YEARLY
nlunotouons, tho schootuonS arc bare and uuiuter.
Atiug, tho factories ara I'll cd with naW aud dirt,
aud hose; the air Is ch4rged with foul odots from
ci5tc cohrts opeu dlains, or the neishbo.ing oil
and varnt works; the river is foul with mud and
O0zs and the retusc OF agrea city the district ends
IN heaps Of Rubbish anl cEpGy lots wal ing for A
rise 10 The market. And the Voms arc oft III worst
OF all n ~ rs ttEs1 =. s, - = :, -